


Luck is not chance—

by LemonflavoredBananas



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Curses, Gen, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Irondad, Parent Tony Stark, Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Precious Peter Parker, Protective Tony Stark, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:00:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22235971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemonflavoredBananas/pseuds/LemonflavoredBananas
Summary: Peter wouldn't consider himself very lucky, not with everything that's happened in his life, but this is taking it a little far.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 7
Kudos: 114





	Luck is not chance—

**Author's Note:**

  * For [embarrassing_myself](https://archiveofourown.org/users/embarrassing_myself/gifts).



> A super late holiday gift for [embarrassing_myself](https://archiveofourown.org/users/embarrassing_myself)! I hope it's worth the wait!!

It’s a normal Tuesday. Peter wakes up groggy and cold, begs Tony for coffee, receives tea instead, and drinks it because it’s warm. He showers, cracks his foot on his desk chair on the way, eats a bowl of cereal, and packs his bag for the day, unfortunately knocking the lukewarm tea onto his laptop and having to frantically wipe it off before it goes into his bag. He’s out the door 50 minutes after his alarm, bundled with a jacket, with energy that no teenager should have so early in the morning.

It’s a normal walk to school. Cold, rushed; he’s excited to get to Ned and tell him about the weird dude he ran into the night before. And he wants to get in the warm school building.

He arrives just in time to greet his friend and hype him up about the story he’s got for lunch time before they have to head to their separate classes. For as tired as everyone is, his first class is always lively and full of chatter, and barely anyone is sitting in their assigned seat, choosing instead to mingle around the room or sit in the configuration they’d originally wanted, before Mrs. Lopez nixed that idea. As though history couldn’t get any more sleep-inducing, it’s 8 AM and no one is able to whisper jokes their friends or pass notes.

The woman walks in and starts unloading her shoulder bag, not even having to call the class to order. They’ve been through this a million times already. Like a well-seasoned troop, each person ends their conversation, and sits in their seats, and quickly the chatter drifts away to be replaced by a few seconds of silence while their teacher gets the computer going. She calls for homework to be passed to the front as the official start of class, right before the intercom beeps with morning announcements.

No one pays it much mind, all unzipping and digging through papers, shoving it into the face of the person in front of them. He hears a few in the back asking about number 9, and they agree on an answer before passing up their assignments.

But Peter is too busy having a crisis to eavesdrop fully and check his own answer, because his homework isn’t where he put it. In fact, his entire homework folder is missing. He internally curses to himself, trying to refrain from looking panicked. He _did_ the work, it was an easy A, he couldn’t miss the opportunity for that.

So, biting his pride, he slips out of his desk and cautiously approaches his teacher.

“Um, ma’am, I’m um sorry but I—um my homework folder, is, it’s not with me. I left it at home on accident,” he tries to explain under the din of light conversation, the loudspeaker, and paper shuffling.

She gives him a disappointed look and hums. “Well, I can give you a late grade if you can get it to me tomorrow. No more exceptions, Peter.”

He nods frantically, and spews his gratitude before sitting back down in his chair, ignoring the glances and snickers. Forgetting homework is the last thing anyone wants do in a school with 20 people in line to be valedictorians.

He pays more attention during the lecture, and takes more careful notes than usual. Maybe it’s to show his teacher that he _is_ responsible, or to show his above average classmates that he’s not an idiot, but whatever it is, it leaves him feeling drained by the end of the hour when he has to run to the front office to call Tony and beg him to bring his folder to school for him. If he doesn’t, he won’t have any homework to turn in for the rest of the day.

Of course, because he’s awesome and somehow always manages to make time for Peter, Tony drives all the way over to bring it, and teases him about it the entire time he’s getting a grateful hug before Peter rushes off to his third hour.

The day passes quickly. He’s ravenous by the time lunch rolls around. He shoves his things into his locker and he’s tapping away at his phone to thank Tony for the save when he—for the first time in two years—runs smack into a person.

He’s apologizing immediately, and thankfully she didn’t have any papers to pick off the ground and she’s just as sorry, running off before he realizes that his phone is laying on the ground with a new crack running across the screen.

He stands there, in the middle of the busy hallway, processing the fact that his heavy-duty protectors didn’t do anything to keep the device intact. Okay.

“Dude, aren’t you sticky?” Ned asks him quietly, bemused, and sets up his first taco. They’d both ended up getting the exact same thing for lunch. “How is it possible for you to drop anything?”

“I don’t—” Peter shakes his head. “It’s so weird man, I’ve been a clutz all day. I forgot my homework folder at home; Mr. Stark had to bring it up.”

Ned winces and gives him a look of pity. “Aw man, that sucks.”

Peter is halfway through a taco when Ned makes a noise. “Hey! Wait, you said you ran into a guy last night? What was that about?

Peter nods, swallowing his bite. “Yeah so there was this guy right—someone called the police and said there was this shady guy walking around so I went over there and, like, I find him and—he’s so shady, man, he had a mask on—and so I ask him what’s up and he straight up just swings at me with like a crowbar or something—”

“Woah dude.”

“Yeah man. So, I fight him, right? And then he, like,” Peter screws up his face in bewilderment. “He starts chanting at me? Like I’m pretty sure he was a wizard or something ‘cause he chanted and was rhyming and stuff and yeah. Then he ran off. I dunno where he went, but like, I think he just wanted to chant at me so I didn’t really bother chasing him down.”

“What was he saying?”

“Oh, no idea. It wasn’t English.”

Somehow, after the disaster of a morning, Peter’s afternoon continues as normal, with no mishaps. Decathlon is a little weird, as all the buzzers stop working when he tries to use them, so he has to resort to making a buzzing noise on his own. Really, the whole practice was just a huge laughing fest, so he leaves with a bit of a pep in his step.

As serious as it gets sometimes, he’s still excited to get into his spider suit and swing around the city helping out. He changes in his favorite alley before sticking his bag to the roof (he’s found the chances of someone stealing it from there are greatly decreased, as opposed to the wall of the alley), and swinging away with a holler.

With his suit heater on, it’s enjoyable to swing around, waving at the people below and resting every now and then on a ledge somewhere. The days are slowly starting to get longer, finally, and the sun isn’t setting for another hour and a half, at least.

New York gives him a break, and only calls on his services for some selfie opportunities, a Q&A, and helping a few old people bring their groceries inside. He works to broaden his area, trying to be available if hard crime is happening outside of his regular territory.

And it seems that way, as he’s ten minutes into scoping out Brooklyn when Karen informs him of a 911 call about two suspicious men roaming around. He parkours his way there and lets the buzz on the back of his neck lead the way to two individuals that look pretty suspicious. Unfortunately, the police haven’t shown up yet, and the two have clearly started acting on their mugging plan, as they corner a random man in the dip between two buildings, both wearing tacky ski masks. Fortunately, Spider-Man seems to be right on time.

He swings behind them, using his chance for surprise to thwip the gun out of Blue Coat guy’s hand. It’s buried behind a thick layer of web before the guy can even process it. But then the fight is on.

He clings to the side of the building, assessing their next moves and trying to figure out how to get the other gun away from the guy in the brown coat. The two men and their victim find Peter quickly, and he has to jump and swing out of reach of the bullets the other guy starts firing in his general direction. He sees the mugging victim run off before either of the two notice him, so Peter counts his blessings and gets to work, now with the assurance that there wouldn’t be a hostage to worry about.

He avoids the bullets and swings as fast and as close as he can to them and blasts the trigger-happy guy to the ground with a web grenade. Before Peter can go any further, his buddy is running for the dropped gun and taking a more careful aim.

Peter dodges, playing defense, waiting for the opportunity to get past the gun and lock the guy down, but he has to keep moving. His assailant follows him with the barrel, not wasting bullets by shooting randomly, like his friend. It makes Peter feel hunted.

His spider sense is already crackling at the edge of his awareness, fading into the adrenaline of the fight, but it wails, suddenly, and he instinctively shoots at the man without thinking. The man shoots at him at the same time.

Peter’s nonlethal weapon clicks failure, drowned out by the blast of the gun successfully firing a bullet.

Peter moves, reacting to the screaming of his senses. Warning signals flash on his HUD, which he ignores. He shoots another web with the other hand. It doesn’t fire.

He has to jump again to avoid another bullet, and keeps jumping until he’s able to grab onto the brick of a building and scramble up to the roof. He runs to get out of eyesight of the man.

Everything goes quiet.

He spins around and creeps back to the edge of the roof, stopping when he’s close enough to see the sidewalk. He’s afraid to get closer, knowing the man might be waiting with a bullet aimed at his face. He glances at the red warning symbols pulsing gently. Both webshooters down—he knew that—and the left side of the suit is damaged. The sting by his ribs tells him he didn’t manage to entirely escape the bullets.

Soft sounds of feet running against the sidewalk bring his attention back, and he dares to step a little closer to the edge, watching his assailant run away, gun still in hand.

He notices the sound of police sirens closing in, so he gets out of the area as quickly as he can with no webs.

“Karen, could you call Mr. Stark, please?” he asks his AI, stopping on a low rooftop and pacing while he waits for the call to go through.

“Hey, Kid,” Mr. Stark answers in a video call. Peter wonders what he must be seeing. Is it just a really close video of Peter’s face?

“Hey, Mr. Stark, my, um, my webshooters broke?”

“Your practically indestructible webshooters broke?”

“Uh, yeah…”

“How’d that happen?”

“Um, I don’t really know. I didn’t do it! They just, stopped working. And the guy ran away. And he had a gun.”

The billionaire’s eyebrows shoot up and he leans a little closer to the screen. “Oh yeah?”

Peter nods, watching a car go by below. “Yeah, so, like, I kinda need a ride home now.”

Mr. Stark leans back again, looking away from the camera. “Okay, I’ll send Happy. You got your bag?”

He shakes his head. “No.”

“Tell him to let you grab it on the way home. Don’t wimp out cause you think it’s too much trouble.”

Peter rolls his eyes. “Can’t anyways, I have homework.”

“All the more reason not to get the bag.”

“Aren’t you supposed to make sure I do my homework?”

“I never agreed to that, that was not in the contract I signed!”

“I don’t think you read it, then, there was absolutely something about homework in there…”

“Nobody reads contracts anymore, Kid, I pay people for that.”

“Mkay, Mr. Businessman. I’ll be back soon.”

“See ya soon.” The video call ends and Peter looks down at his innocent looking weapons. He tries to shoot them again, with no result. It’s weird. It’s unlikely. He has a vague idea in his head about why these things are happening, just as unlikely as his webshooters malfunctioning for no apparent reason at the same time, but he’s seen weirder stuff.

He sits at the edge of the roof and watches the sunset.

The sun is almost gone, and everything is brilliantly orange when an expensive, shiny, black car pulls off the road below him. Happy gets out, and immediately glances up at him and waves him down, grumbling.

He hops into the back, pulling off his mask as the man starts driving a little too fast down the city roads. “Hi, Happy, thanks for picking me up,” he greets.

“Yeah,” the man replies gruffly.

Peter had managed to cover some distance when he traveled over to Brooklyn, but it’s not terribly far from Midtown and only takes a half-hour drive with the traffic, most of which is spent in silence, listening to the radio.

Happy parks in the garage, heading up with Peter instead of dropping him off. The private elevator shoots up with speed, but it’s only a few seconds after the doors have closed that the machine comes to an abrupt halt.

Peter immediately looks at Happy, the responsible adult, while Happy busies himself with confusedly looking around the little room and pressing the buttons. “FRIDAY?” he calls.

“Yes, Mr. Hogan?”

“Why is the elevator not working?”

It’s quiet for a moment. “I do not see an obvious cause of malfunction. I will alert Boss to your situation.”

Happy sighs. “That’s great.”

Peter frowns at his shoes. “I’m sorry.”

“What? What are you sorry for?” Happy turns to look at him and finds an awfully guilty look on his face.

“I… I think it might be me.”

“You’re gonna have to explain more than that.”

“Well, I mean, I could totally be wrong…. But the other day I was, you know, fighting this guy. He snuck up on me, tried to hit me with a metal pipe, and like he wasn’t hard to run off, but like, he was chanting in a weird language at me and I thought it was just normal New York stuff but, like, I’ve been really _really_ unlucky since that happened.

Happy furrows his eyebrows at him. “You think a weirdo cursed you?”

“I don’t know? It just seems like everything’s going wrong. My shooters, I forgot my homework at home, Oh! And I dropped my phone and it cracked.” He pulls the device out to show Happy. “…And now this,” Peter adds, using his phone to gesture around them.

“I’ve seen a lot, but Harry Potter magic doesn’t actually exist.”

Peter nods. “I—yeah, I know. Just seems weird.”

“Boss is on his way with the engineering department.” FRIDAY interrupts.

Happy sighs again. “This is gonna be a whole big thing, now, isn’t it?”

And it is. They’re halfway between floors and Peter has to help Happy climb out, then climb out himself, and try to act cool in front of Mr. Stark’s employees, who have just seen Spider-Man bodily lift a much larger man out of a broken elevator. Yeah, He’s gonna have a great time keeping this particular moment from sticking around.

Especially with Mr. Stark involved. And his involvement means hanging out at the edges encouraging and laughing. He’s not very helpful.

At least they weren’t in there for very long. Peter absolutely doesn’t think being stuck inside of an elevator with Happy for a long time would be very fun.

Tony claps him on the shoulder when he heads to stand next to the man. “What’s the score now?” Peter looks questioningly at him. “How many times have I rescued you?”

“Oh, so many times, Mr. Stark,” Peter dutifully answers, instead of a thank you.

Tony smiles and sees Happy shoot him a face. “I’ve got dinner upstairs.”

That’s all the prompting Peter needs. The Delmar’s sandwich he’d had as a patrol snack is long gone, and nothing sounds better than a good dinner with Tony after the day he’d had. Peter heads for the stairs and turns back when he doesn’t hear Tony following.

“Head up, Kid, gonna send Happy off.”

Tony waits until he’s out of earshot to talk to Happy. “What’s up?”

Happy shrugs. “He told me in the elevator that he thinks someone cursed him with bad luck, some guy he ran into the other day. Figured I should let you know in case he decides to keep clam about it.”

“Hm. Well, sounds about right. You’re going to drive him to school tomorrow. Karen says he was grazed by a bullet.”

“Mm, damn. Bad enough to need stitches?”

“I don’t know, she said it wasn’t, but I want to look at it. You can head out, done for the day.”

“Take care of the kid!” Happy calls behind him. Tony was already planning on doing that, so he doesn’t respond.

He takes another elevator, then climbs the stairs up another two floors to reach his apartment, and heads for the kitchen where he knows Peter will most likely be piling up a plate full of food.

Peter, now dressed in normal clothes, is in the middle of the kitchen, looking at him like a deer in headlights. Surrounding him is the stir fry Tony had made, which Peter is trying to scoop back into its pot.

“Pete, what the fuck?”

“I’m so sorry! The handle broke and it dropped all over the floor and I’m so sorry! I really didn’t mean to!”

“Pete, you’re fine,” Tony placates, and steps around the rice and vegetables to get to Peter. “Is this about what you told Happy?”

Peter sighs. His greasy hands fall limp into the mess. “Yeah. I didn’t wanna, like, believe it but I don’t just drop things. I’m sticky, Mr. Stark.”

“Yup, you sure are,” Tony comments, looking at the rice stuck to Peter’s oily hands.

Peter goes back to scooping rice, and Tony joins him. They pick up as much as they can, but it doesn’t matter. Tony doesn’t intend to eat off the floor.

“Well,” Tony says, washing his hands off. “Where do you want to order from?”

Peter is quiet for a moment. Once upon a time, he probably would have insisted on eating the food anyways. “Thai,” he says instead. He’s come a long way. But he still has some things to work on.

“I also know about your bullet wound.”

Peter groans. “It’s _not_ a bullet wound. Doesn’t even hurt,” he grumbles.

“Still should have told me. Or Happy. Or someone.”

“It’s just really not a big deal.” He lifts his shirt up, exposing pink, freshly healed flesh. “See? Was fine before Happy even got to me.”

“Hm. Okay, you’re off the hook. This time.” Tony levels a look at his kid. He really doesn’t enjoy being told these things secondhand. “Happy’s taking you to school tomorrow, anyways. No arguing,” he adds when he sees the teenage drama working its way out of Peter.

“Fiiiiiiiiine,” Peter concedes.

Thai is ordered, and delivered, and Tony does not at all snicker at the careful manner in which Peter holds everything now. But dinner goes by quickly, and the episode of _Nailed It!_ goes by even faster, and soon they’re throwing away their boxes and putting away dishes and the matter at hand can’t wait any longer.

“Alright,” Tony says, clapping his hands together and hating himself immediately after for doing something so pedestrian. “We need to figure out your curse.”

Peter meets Tony in the workshop with his suit, detaching the malfunctioned webshooters as he goes. He plops down onto a stool right next to Tony, and Tony pretends it doesn’t make his insides warm when Peter feels confident enough to be so close.

“Okay, first of all, FRIDAY, bring up the footage of Peter’s encounter with the guy who cursed him.” He sits attentively and waits the few seconds it should take for her to find it and set up a screen to watch.

“Sorry, Boss, but there doesn’t appear to be any footage.”

Tony’s eyebrows shoot up, and Peter’s furrows.

“What do you mean?” Peter asks quickly.

“There is a span of ten minutes and 24 seconds of recording time while Peter was in the suit on Monday that is missing. I’m detecting it’s because of outside interference.”

“Oh…” Peter says, and Tony glances at him. “Yeah. Karen said something was messing with her tech. I didn’t realize it cut the video. I think the guy had something, like a signal blocker,” Peter tells Tony.

“Well it must have been something good to mess with my stuff. Is there anything you can pull from it, FRI?”

“I’ll work on it, Sir. It’s choppy but there is still information coming through.”

Tony grabs a web shooter from the table and turns it over in his hands. It doesn’t look broken at all, not so much as a scratch on it. He believes Peter, that they’re broken. And he’s starting to believe that there is something more nefarious at play. His tech shouldn’t malfunction.

To cover all his bases, he aims it at a far wall, and presses the trigger. The two watch as a perfect web shoots and covers the wall in delicate goo, exactly as it was meant to.

“Oh, come on,” Peter groans. “That’s so typical. I swear to god, Mr. Stark, they actually weren’t firing!”

“I believe you. Here,” he hands the weapon back to Peter. “Shoot it again.”

Peter aims it, looking much clumsier that he usually does without the tool being attached to his wrist, but he clicks the trigger, and nothing happens.

Peter makes an exclamatory noise. “See?!” The teen looks at Tony with wide eyes and shakes his head, deflating in an instant. “I am cursed.”

Tony doesn’t like the way Peter says the words. He’s heard the same sentiment come out of the boy before, during late night depression episodes. Tony hadn’t known quite how to comfort him, then. He’d been out of his depth, completely out of his comfort zone.

But this is different. This is, honestly, just average stuff in their world. He can handle this.

“You’re going to be fine, Underoos. FRI will track down the guy, and he’ll reverse whatever he did, no more bad luck for you.”

Peter nods. “Okay,” he agrees easily, trustingly.

Tony might have stuck around his workshop longer, perhaps all night, to work on fixing his kid’s curse and track down the weirdo that cursed him, but the more he looks around, the more he spots disasters waiting to happen. Sharp objects, hanging objects, machinery, robots, weapons, all of which could kill Peter if the universe has it out for him. He already could have died from his webshooter malfunction. Peter’s skill and quick reflexes were probably the only thing that saved him from getting shot somewhere more lethal.

“Up for another show?” Tony asks, throwing some hopeful inflection in there so Peter will be more likely to want to make him happy.

“Oh, sure yeah that sounds good, if you’re not too busy…” Peter says, gathering his suit and webshooters gathered in a neat pile on the table. Tony throws his arm around Peter’s shoulder blades and marches them back up to the living room, walking behind him up the stairs and not-so-subtly steering him away from the large windows and the TV hanging on the wall.

He thought parental paranoia had already overtaken him, the day he’d agreed to take care of Pete instead of leaving him to the system and found himself wishing he’d spent more time learning how to cook healthy meals and never shifting his car into drive until he heard the sound of a seatbelt buckling securely. All around him are things that could fall, stab, electrocute, injure, maim, and he’s determined to provide the kid a line of defense when he clearly has none. He tries not to think about all the things that could go wrong while they’re sleeping, and then decides that tonight is most likely going to be a sleepless one.

…

Tony is weirder than ever, the next morning. He’d been weird the night before, too. Peter is used to the helicopter supervision during superhero stuff, but it’s weird and annoying to have the man following him around and keeping him away from things that he wouldn’t normally keep away from.

He’s grateful that Tony is taking the matter seriously, though. After all the weird coincidences, Peter is getting more and more concerned about his curse, as ridiculous as it sounds. It’s nice to know that he doesn’t have to deal with it by himself.

It would be nice to get his own cereal, though.

“C’mon, Mr. Stark, it’ll take two seconds—”

“Nope,” the man says, pushing him out of the doorway and physically blocking him. “Not gonna happen, knives and hot things and death waiting back here, I’ll get it.”

Peter watches Tony zoom around the kitchen—probably trying to move quickly so Peter won’t sneak back in—and grab all the necessary ingredients for a bowl of cereal (Peter absolutely commits the image of Tony Stark carefully pouring cereal to memory). He places the nearly overfilled bowl in Peter’s hands and waves him towards the couch, heading back in for coffee.

“Maybe you should stay home today,” Tony mentions as they sit on the couch watching the morning news.

“I’m not going to stay home. I’m just going to school, I’ll come right back after, I’ll be fine,” Peter assures.

“You don’t have any tests today; I can call you in sick—”

“Tony, I’ll be fine,” Peter says firmly. They square off, each firm in their argument but unsure whether they should pursue it.

“Happy’s still driving you,” Tony finally concedes.

“Fine with me,” Peter agrees. He’s used to being driven, despite living closer to his school than ever before.

“I have a lead, by the way.”

“Mm the guy?” Peter asks through a mouthful of fruit loops. With marshmallows.

“Voice, some stills. I should have a name and an address by the end of the day.”

“Oh, well that’s good. I can go with you?”

“Don’t you know it’s rude to invite yourself to parties?”

“No one ever taught me a single manner.”

Tony smiles. “Obviously, you’re going. You’re gonna be in the background, though. I can’t have you screwing everything up with your bad mojo.”

“That’s fair.”

Tony brings Peter’s bowl back to the kitchen, and then mother hens him all the way out the door to meet Happy, asking about homework and jackets and lunch money. “Didn’t we have a talk about boundaries? Do we need to talk about boundaries again?” Happy says, eyeing Tony. Peter gives his guardian a look.

“Yup, yup, and I’ll be following strict boundaries once my kid no longer has a curse on his head. Bye, Pete,” Tony says while Peter climbs into the back seat, catching a farewell before the door shuts. Tony points a stern finger at his most trusted employee, who nods before driving his precious cargo away from Tony’s protective hold.

“He’ll calm down soon,” Happy offers to the rearview mirror. He meets Peter’s eyes when the kid looks up at him.

“I get it, I guess,” Peter sighs. “Little annoying that I can’t even go in the kitchen or walk downstairs by myself.”

“Well, he’ll probably spend the whole day fixing this so, like I said, he’ll calm down soon. He likes to keep his people close.”

“I know,” Peter smiles, watching the city go by through the window. He might have, at one point, resented Tony’s overprotectiveness. But a lot has happened since then.

Happy doesn’t normally enjoy chit-chatting so early in the morning, so Peter pops his earbuds in and drowns out the morning radio with his own playlist.

Like lightening, he tenses and his sixth sense is _blaring_ so sharply that it takes his breathe away.

“Happy—” he shouts over the volume of his earbuds, a warning, a question, a request for reassurance, but it is already too late.

…

“ _Well, Mark, skies are going to be clear today, and the high will be in the upper fifties—”_

A sleek black phone sitting nearby on a table interrupts the weather report with a wail. Its owner abandons his research and grabs it quickly, reading with lightning speed.

_Happy Hogan_

_Emergency Level 2_

_40°45’36” N 73°57’40” W, Intersection of 1 st and 60th _

Tony’s heart drops to his stomach. He stands and impatiently signals for a suit to envelop him, launching out of a glass window that could have opened, but not fast enough.

Scenarios run through his head as he flies over the morning commuters at jet speed. Masked men yanking his disoriented kid out of a ruined car; Peter, broken and bloody in the middle of the road; fire, explosions. A level two isn’t the worst thing, but it means someone is hurt. Tony has to be fast enough. He has to get there in time.

“In time” is relative. He counts it as “in time to save Peter from death” but that is a fairly low standard. The scene he arrives at is definitely not in time with anything.

The intersection is at a dead stop, and all four roads surrounding it are filled with honking cars that are valiantly trying to move. In the middle is a smooshed, bruised, white car. Totaled, smoking, still. Off towards the side, partially on a sidewalk, is the black car he’d just packed Peter into not even 20 minutes ago. It is battered, surrounded by random pieces of vehicle. Most notably, its belly is facing straight up to the sky.

A chill runs up Tony’s back as he lands by the overturned car. The driver’s side is facing him, its window s shattered clean off, the door hanging open. He can’t see Happy or anyone else inside.

Trepidation slows his race to save Peter. He walks slowly, feeling heavy, around the car to the other side, the side Peter had gotten into, glass crunching under each metallic step.

The first thing he sees is the back end of his missing bodyguard, on his knees, top half obscured inside of the car. Tony’s armor opens and he steps out of it.

“Happy,” he says, not sure where the rest of his sentence is going.

The man backs out of the car. He’s covered in scrapes and his dark suit looks dirty and rumpled. His hands are covered in blood.

“Tony thank god,” Happy says in relief. “Here, get in there, I need to call an ambulance for him.”

Tony really doesn’t like hearing that, but he doesn’t waste any time shoving his jeans into the broken glass on the cement so he can finally see what state his kinda-but-not-really son is in.

His empty head lights up like a Christmas tree with panic, worry, fear, when he sees that Peter is not buckled safety in his seat waiting for help to get out. Instead, he is lying limp on the ceiling of the car, bloody and bruised and unconscious. At least, he hopes it’s only that.

“Peter?!” he calls, trying to crawl inside without touching him, but it just isn’t feasible in the tiny space, so he clumsily backs up and runs to the other side.

“Peter? C’mon, Peter, wake up for me,” he begs, eyes roving over the bloody wound on his forehead and the cuts on his cheeks and neck. The poor kid is a mess. “FRIDAY, scan!” he shouts towards the door so that his AI can hear him. The suit steps into view and robotically performs the actions necessary to scan Peter.

“Scans indicate minor cuts and bruises, a minor head wound with a possible concussion, possibly a fractured rib, and a dislocated shoulder,” she reports. The diagnosis isn’t anything life threatening, but FRIDAY’s scans aren’t 100% accurate and she is liable to miss things. He can’t relax until Peter is in the safe hands of a doctor.

The light behind him dims as Happy leans inside. “I’ve got the Jackson Avenue Meds coming down with a couple ambulances.”

“What happened?” Tony manages to turn away from his injured charge to look at him.

“He just came out of nowhere. Think it was just an accident, but he hit us going full speed through the light.”

He, historically, doesn’t have a good relationship with car accidents, and he defaults to trying not to pay attention to the overturned, ruined car he is sitting inside of, but he can’t help but notice that something very important seems to be missing, especially since the totaled Nissan outside obviously hit the car right on Peter’s door.

There are no airbags deployed.

“Hap, the airbags,” he says, turning again to look at the other side, which should be covered in deflated airbags, but there’s nothing.

“What?” Happy asks, leaning back in.

“The airbags, there’s no airbags—they didn’t deploy.”

Happy’s face twists into his serious, stoic, “we have a problem” face as he examines the backseat, leaning out to check the front. “They should have gone off. Right? He hit us on the passenger side, they should have gone off over there at least.”

And that’s not all. He’d thought it when he’d first looked into the car, but it was wiped away by the sight that met him. He’d expected to find Peter strapped into his seat. Why wasn’t he strapped in, still?

The seat Peter was sat in is above him, and he reaches up to pull at the seatbelt, which is still buckled, but loosened so much that it is hanging down, and very clearly wouldn’t have held a body still while rolling. Tony can easily picture Peter getting the lights knocked out of him when the car slammed into his door, and ragdolling out of his seat as they rolled to a stop.

“Bad luck,” Tony states, a bad taste in his mouth to accompany the pit in his stomach.

Happy grimaces at him, suddenly believing Peter’s story quite a bit more than he had.

Tony climbs out when the sirens are too loud for comfort, and then cut off abruptly. Happy is waiting for them and explains the situation, so Tony stands by the car and looks around at the scene. Lots of people are filming, which is expected but unpleasant, and cars are turning around to find a detour instead of trying to navigate through the intersection, which is awfully nice of them. More sirens grow in the distance. Other ambulances, police, fire trucks, all heading here.

The paramedics wheel a gurney over, stacked with supplies. He gratefully moves over to watch as they set up to get Peter out of the car with as little movement as possible. God, he could have a broken neck. He might not walk again.

Tony would never forgive himself for this. He _knew_ the world was out to get Peter today, and being inside of a car, twice, and several miles away for eight hours was just asking for something terrible to happen. And it did, all because some random asshole isn’t happy with Spider-Man.

It doesn’t feel good to watch his unconscious kid be put in an ambulance, neck brace uncomfortably clasped to him, or stuck in a waiting room while doctors work on him, the brutal hope that he’ll be okay overtaken by the familiar cynicism that tells him that this is real life and people are killed every single day for no reason, and they didn’t have an apparently life-threatening curse on their heads. Things happen, it tells him. Things happen, and he could die even when he looks okay. They could miss something; he could be bleeding out before anyone even knows.

He’s not a praying man. But he’s prayed before. He prays now.

“Sir?”

He startles and stands to face the woman that had called for him. “Is he okay?”

“Yes, we’re running a few more tests now, but so far everything has come up clean. No surprises. He had a dislocated shoulder which we set, and two broken ribs, and a mild concussion. He’ll need a lot of rest, but he’ll be okay.”

“Can I see him? Is he awake?” Tony asks, relief creeping into him.

“Yes, sir, he was drowsy and given pain meds that put him back to sleep. The remaining tests shouldn’t take long. He doesn’t need to stay overnight, if you’d like to take him home.”

“Yeah that would—I’ll take him home when he’s ready.”

She smiles and walks with him to a private room. “He’ll be taken here when he’s finished, and the doctor will update you if anything is found.”

Tony has played the hospital waiting game before. It’s not the best one, but at least this is one of the times when he has reassurances. Not for the first time, he’s glad to be where he is in the world, and not a regular person whose son wouldn’t get the best medical care available, because they didn’t have enough to pay.

A bed is wheeled in soon, and he stands by while the nurses lock their cargo into place. There’s not much set up to do, besides an IV drip for pain meds, so they’re finished and leaving the room in a few minutes, allowing Tony to sit back in the chair by the bed, and take note of all the changes since he’d last seen the kid. Stitches in his forehead, face wiped clean. The cuts from glass are already healing, and the bruises are darker than they were. His school clothes are gone, most likely cut up and ruined with blood, replaced with a soft hospital gown. His right arm is laying in a sling across his chest.

Tony covers him up more with the blanket to keep the hospital chill away from him, and resolves himself to working from his phone for a few hours until Peter is awake, and ready to go back home. He has work to do in the meantime. It’s clear to him now that whoever put this curse on Peter intended for him to get hurt by it, get killed by it, and seemingly the only thing saving his life is his enhancements. Peter can’t play this game for much longer, not when each roll of the dice always lands on snake eyes.

…

Tony has never driven so carefully or so slowly in his life. He checks around every corner, and eases into each intersection after checking the other roads. He completely avoids train tracks, the highway, and doesn’t speed around people when they’re being stupid or slow. He takes his time, and doesn’t look away from the road. He uses every mirror at his disposal. He’s not sure what holds him back from setting up a suit to fly above and guard them on their way home, but the thought sticks with him the entire way.

Peter is quiet and Tony doesn’t try to coerce conversation out of him. He wants Peter to stay relaxed and heighten his chances of sleeping for the rest of the day. Oh, damn, he needs to call Peter in sick to his school. Hopefully he’ll remember that when he’s got him tucked in to bed.

The realization of what he’s thinking stuns him for a moment, and several streets pass by unnoticed. He’s only been Peter’s guardian for five months, a flash of time that’s felt like ages, and nothing at all to him. And maybe it’s not at all like if he’d been caring for Peter his whole life, but his priorities had shifted so suddenly and so immensely, that he rarely ever stops to wonder when his life had been taken over by thoughts of _did peter finish his homework I need to order more vegetables maybe I can get him to like Brussel sprouts how many shoes should I buy him at one time no he can’t have coffee that’s not good for kids._ 12 AM bedtimes and calling Peter in sick to school took hold of his life within a month of looking after the boy, and he hadn’t even noticed.

But he wouldn’t change it for the world. Obviously, he’d send Peter back to May if the option was available. But there would be heartbreak. No doubt about that.

Driving Peter around feels different, now. When he drives him home, he’s driving him to _their_ home. He drives him to dinner and they eat together, and drops him off at school, where Tony is seen as Peter’s guardian. Instead of being courteous or providing convenience for him, it’s his responsibility. He’s obligated. But it’s the best obligation he’s ever had.

“Here we are, bud,” Tony announces as he pulls into the parking garage under the building, heading to the back for his reserved spot by a private elevator.

“Cool. I’m good with not being in a car for a bit,” Peter says, wearily trying to climb out before Tony races around to help him out.

“Alright, take it easy, I know you’re all Godzilla’d up on superpowers but you’re still full of extra-strength morphine.”

“Yup, feeling that.”

At least he’s not feeling the broken ribs.

Tony leads Peter straight to his bedroom with no complaints, helping him down and pulling his shoes off for him while Peter lies like a limp noodle.

“I’m gonna miss practice,” Peter sighs dejectedly.

“You’re the star of the team, one missed practice isn’t going to hurt you.”

“I’m not the star of the team.”

“You sure are, and you need to sleep for the rest of the day, until dinner, if you want to go to school tomorrow.” Which is absolutely a lie, He’s not letting the kid leave this room until he’s safe again.

He pulls the blankets over Peter, letting him bury himself and relishing in the comfort he exudes. It’s quiet, relaxed, domestic. The room is full of Peter’s things; clothes on the desk chair, a couple socks scattered by the door where Peter takes his shoes off. Peter’s pet project, his computer, sits quiet on the desk, surrounded by knickknacks, a cup and a plate, and some school things that hadn’t made it back to Peter’s locker yet. The TV spot is clean but unorganized. Everything is still and familiar, lived in. It’s comfortable. Peter is comfortable in this room. Tony feels more confident now in his abilities as a caretaker than he has in ages, despite recent events.

“Wait, what about the guy?” Peter asks, popping his head up to look at Tony as he heads out the door to get a glass of water.

“Yeah raincheck on that for a bit, Bud.”

“But, like… What if more bad stuff happens?”

Tony walks back over to his side. “You’ll be safe here. No going anywhere, no doing anything. I’ll keep an eye on you.”

Peter might live full time with him, maybe see him as a little more than just a guardian, a mentor, or a friend. But he doesn’t think he’ll ever grow out of the irrevocable trust he felt for Iron Man, and Tony Stark. If the man says he’ll keep Peter safe, it’s the truth.

“Okay,” Peter says, relaxing again. He’s dead tired, anyways. “But I still want to go when you go.”

“Sure, I know you love a good ass kicking.”

Peter takes a new round of pain meds and prepares for a midday nap, secure in the knowledge that someone will watch over him while he’s knocked out.

And Tony does keep an eye on him, from farther than he’d really like, but he has work to do that needs to be done immediately, with the resources from his workshop.

He sits down and, a little more cliché than he’d like, cracks his knuckles. “Let’s get to work FRIDAY, we have a witch to catch.”

…

He starts with the choppy footage from Peter’s messed up suit recordings. They show a man in a black coat, black pants, and a black mask covering his entire face, even his eyes and mouth. From what Tony can tell, the man had the encounter set up, was waiting for Peter and ambushed him when he got there. His voice barely comes through, only a few words, but it’s enough to run voice recognition. Nothing comes from it.

So instead of relying on his own technology, Tony uses security cameras. They’re also mostly useless, because whatever the man had with him to screw with the recordings, severely fucked the average street cameras. But he made a mistake.

Tony follows the cameras, line after line, static and blurry images and cut out sections, follows them all in a line until he finds one that works. And then, it’s only a matter of spotting him. It takes all of a few seconds, where he walks into view, sans mask, just a regular looking man.

Tony purses his mouth, and FRIDAY is already running facial recognition. He doesn’t seem familiar or superpowered. This would all make more sense if this was someone Peter had run up against, and Tony is keeping a list, just in case anyone ever tries to bite back.

“Here’s the match, Boss,” his AI announces, pulling up a picture of the man from his license, and a list of his basic information. He was a career cop in the NYPD before being fired for an incident involving the death of a man he had in custody. He works in security now.

Tony considers the information, while he reads over the current address. Nothing really adds up here, but it’s easiest just to visit the guy and ask. A smile forms, and he feels confident that this whole thing is just about to come to an end.

His happiness is doused by an alarm blaring. He jumps off his stool.

“FRIDAY?!” he barks, fighting to be heard over the sound.

“There is a fire in Peter’s room! The sprinkler system is unresponsive!” She sounds panicked, but it really doesn’t compare to the heart stopping fear Tony feels upon processing the words, and what they mean.

He runs, faster than he should with his health the way it is, wishing he’d thought to put on a suit first but not willing to spend the time getting in it or even calling it. He doesn’t think, just runs, and turns, and runs upstairs, and turns again, sliding against the tile and scuffing it. This floor is quiet, the alarm from below drifting upstairs. FRIDAY’S entire fucking system must be down.

Peter’s door is cracked open about a foot, exactly as he’d left it, and brilliant orange flames are leaking out of it, eating at the carpet, spewing black into the air to crawl across the ceiling. If it wasn’t for his rushing heart and prickling terror, Tony would be sure this was just a nightmare.

Thoughts start drifting back to him, warning him not to jump into the flames. He doesn’t know how much of the room is on fire, doesn’t know what lies beyond what he can see. But it just doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter whatsoever. His kid could be burning right now and literally nothing will stand in the way of Tony saving him.

He kicks the door open, jumping back when the flames try to reach up and bite him through his jeans. He steps back, and takes a running leap through the doorway, automatically moving when he lands on the other side, just in case he’d landed in the middle of the fire.

But he opens his eyes, seeing the trail of orange heat lining the front wall, destroying Peter’s desk and hand-built computer and ending at the door. It’s a small fire. God, it’s just barely started.

And the bed, Peter’s bed, is completely fine. Somehow, he’s even still asleep.

Cursing, he runs to the side, flinging the blankets off Peter and shaking him, calling out to him, begging him to wake up. The poor kid startles awake violently, no doubt because of the rough treatment and Tony imagines his spider sense is probably going haywire right now.

“What?! What?!” Peter yells, looking at him. And something must have caught his attention, or his sixth sense calls from the blaze, because he jackknifes straight up to look at the wall the fire is consuming, face dropping in horror.

Tony yanks on him, pulling him out of the bed without the chance for him to get his bearings. But even with a concussion and a super-strength dose of morphine, Peter is able to fall gracefully and pick himself up.

“Run and jump!” Tony commands him, shoving him towards the door, instinct urging him to stay away from the heat but knowing it’s the only way out. “Run and jump!”

Peter backs up into his arms a little and he’s wishes he could comfort him, god he’s probably so scared, he just woke up and he’s injured and full of drugs, but then he takes off like a lightning bolt and leaps through the smoke and flames, and Tony doesn’t spare a thought before following. He has to make sure he got out okay.

Peter is backs against the other side of the hallway, watching him as he lands. He’s wide-eyed and panting, a little ashy and singed from his brief encounter with the flames. But he’s okay, he’s safe, Tony got there in time.

Flashing lights and a squealing alarm startle both of them, Peter’s hands flying up to cover his ears. Tony turns when he hears sizzling and spraying, smiling when he sees it’s the sprinklers in Peter’s room activating, successfully dousing the fire and leaving ugly char and smoke in its wake.

He turns back to Peter and, single-mindedly, pulls the kid roughly into his chest. His heart warms to feel his head plop down on his shoulder and strong arms circle his back.

After a hearty moment, he sniffs and pulls away, wrinkling his nose at the heavy smoke smell drenching Peter.

“Okay. We’re taking care of this,” he states firmly, walking off towards the workshop, listening to make sure his charge is following him.

“We’re what?” he hears Peter ask while lightly jogging to catch up.

“I’ve got the name of the guy. We’re going to him, and fix all of this _right now_.”

“Oh yeah that’s—that would be great,” Peter responds, shakily.

Tony marches himself and his charge back down to the workshop and doesn’t stop until he’s in the middle of it, arms and legs spread out and demanding Friday suit him up.

Fully encased in armor, sans faceplate, he turns back to Peter.

The kid looks at him when he turns. He’s shaking slightly, he looks scared, but trusting and willing to do anything he’s told to. He doesn’t look like Spider-Man, or a superhero. He looks like a teenager with a concussion and ten stitches on his forehead, who’d just minutes ago woken up to his room on fire. He’s probably in shock, coming down from pain meds, and desperately in need of good rest. But Tony can’t let these mishaps progress any further. He’s going to capitalize on the quiet rage building in him and use the desperate, unquenchable fear for something beneficial: whooping ass.

“Suit up,” he commands his kid, feeling horrible for it. Peter’s eyes widen and he clumsily takes off his pajamas and slips into his suit without complaint or argument. He stands tall and straight in front of Tony, mask off, and a determined look replacing the shock, confusion, and fear.

Tony steps up to him and stares him in the eye. “You’re going to listen to me. You’re not going to argue or ignore me, or anything. You’ll stay _behind_ me, and you’re not going to do anything reckless or stupid. Capiche?”

Peter nods.

“I can’t leave you home alone, and this guy has the upper hand. We’re going to fix this tonight, but only if you _listen to me_ , and do every single thing I tell you to do.”

Peter nods again. “I get it.”

Tony squints at him, not able to see any sort of deceit in Pete’s face. “Alright. Think you can hold on for the ride?” he asks, turning around and lowering himself slightly. He feels Peter’s weight climb onto the back of his armor, and sees two hands attach themselves to his chest plate. If he’d built special foot rests that are perfectly positioned for exactly this scenario, no one mentions it.

Tony flies low to the ground, a little slower than he’d like. He tries desperately not to think about all the things that could go wrong. He doesn’t want to jinx them.

He comes to a soft stop in the air above a street in Brooklyn, scoping out the apartment building FRIDAY led him to. She highlights a window on the fourth floor, right in view of the street, which isn’t ideal, but it’ll do. Hopefully no one sees Iron Man breaking into a random citizen’s home.

He normally would have performed a dramatic entrance, but his concussed kid is hanging onto his back with a curse that’s trying to kill him, and nothing terrible happened on the flight over so instead he flies up to the window and blasts it open, gently crawling through the small square and landing in a dated living room.

He recognizes the man that rushes in, gun drawn, and aims his hand at him, stopping him with the whine of it powering on.

“Easy, Greg. Me and Spidey are just here to talk.”

“You—you’re breaking and entering—!”

“And you’ve been messing where you shouldn’t’a been messin’.”

“Wha—”

“Ah ah! No, you talk too much. This is gonna go real smooth if you just take the spell off Spider-Man, nice and easy.”

The man decides to play dumb, but it’s almost too easy to see through his panicked, confused face. “I don’t know what—”

“No, see, I know for a fact that you know what I’m talking about. I’m not going to say it again,” He fires up his other blaster, just to get his point across. “Put the gun down and take the fucking spell off him.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about! Get the fuck out of my house before I call the police!”

“This won’t take that long. Stop pointing your piddly-ass gun at someone who is bulletproof and has ten times the fire power.”

The man hesitates in his anger, threatened and looking for a way out.

“Put down the gun!” Tony commands, loudly.

“I’m not going to do that! You’re in _my_ house!”

“Listen, guy, I sure am in your house, I know your address, I know where you work, I know where you like to eat on Tuesday nights. Take the fucking spell off my kid or this is going to get _real_ fucking ugly.”

The man, Greg, stares in shock for a minute, gun still pointed at the intruders. “I—I didn’t do anything!” he protests weakly.

“I tracked you down, on the cameras, before you turned on your signal blocker. There’s absolutely no doubt it was you,” Tony responds. “I’m not going to hurt you, or kill you, I’m not even going to go to anyone else with this. You won’t hear from me again after this, if you just take the spell off of Spider-Man. That’s all I want.”

“I recognize your voice,” Peter says, barely peeking out from behind Tony, drawing Greg’s attention to him. “He’s serious, I just don’t want to die, man.”

Greg’s face screws up and his aim wavers. “I’m not—I didn’t…”

“You did. Undo it,” Tony commands, patience thinning.

“I—even if I did, there was probably a good reason for it!”

“Jesus Christ—”

“It probably took a long time to find the spell and a lot of planning to set it up—!”

“Why then?” Peter interrupts. Tony shakes his head, ensuring that Peter is still protected behind him, but lets him have his interrogation.

“Because you shouldn’t be doing what you’re doing! I mean, look at you! No supervision, no rules, you answer to no one and you dispense justice at your own will! It’s just not right!”

“And killing people is?” Peter asks. Tony winces a little, knowing the man’s history and watching for retaliation at the unknown insult.

“You can kill just as easily and no one will bat an eye!”

“But I don’t want to! That’s why I have the webs, so I can’t kill people!”

“But you could! You could! There’s nothing but your own moral compass keeping you from killing whoever you see fit! You and the Avengers and all of them!”

“So, you’re going to kill me, to keep me from—going bad?”

“That’s the only way to stop you!”

“It’s really not.” Peter looks up at Tony, then back at Greg. “Getting rid of the people who go against your beliefs isn’t right. You can disagree, you can fight to make what I do illegal, but killing me is wrong, you can’t deny that.”

The man shakes his head, but doesn’t say anything.

“I’m just a guy, man. I’m just a regular guy,” Peter continues. “I’ve got a family and friends and a whole future in front of me, and I have these superpowers. I had to do something with them, I had to help people. I don’t believe in killing, I just turn people in to the police, man. That’s all. I just want to help.”

The two heroes watch the man blink in the face of that statement. “You’re not like the others,” Greg says, finally, his countenance winding down.

“You’re right,” Tony says, startling the man slightly. “He’s the best of us. So, you can see now why I’m willing to do anything to keep him safe? You messed up, here. Your plan didn’t go right, I know who you are and I’m not as kindhearted as Spidey.”

Greg lets out a breath, hesitantly dropping his aim to the floor and clicking the safety back on.

“Good boy,” Tony says, regretting it when the ex-cop frowns at him but thankfully he decides not to do anything stupid to save his pride.

“I have to get the book,” Greg says, walking into the kitchen. Tony follows, and watches him set up a stool, climb on top, and reach into a high cabinet, pulling out a thick book.

He opens it to a bookmarked page and Tony tries to read it upside down, but it’s printed in script that he can’t read.

“How did you get that?” He asks.

Greg looks up from his searching. “Got it in Iran.” He walks over to his trashcan and Tony narrows his eyes, watching the man dig through it before pulling out a small Ziplock bag and putting it in his pocket. He looks up and finds Peter, standing where he can see him, and opens his mouth to read from the book—

“This better not hurt him.”

“It won’t.”

Tony nods for him to continue, watching him closely.

The rhythmic words sound extremely familiar to Peter. It only takes at most a minute for Greg to finish, and when he does, both men look at him expectantly.

“I don’t—feel anything.”

Greg slams the book shut. “Okay, spell’s off, get out.”

Tony sticks a hand out. “Give me the book.”

Greg rolls his eyes, quietly simmering as he hands the book over reluctantly. Tony turns, shepherding Peter in front of him, aware that the man still has a gun sitting on his coffee table. But the dumbass kid sticks his head out of his cover to look back at the man.

“Thank you, sir. I’m sorry that what I do bothers you, I promise I’ll never kill anyone.”

“Mkay, Kid, c’mon,” Tony ushers. He turns so that Peter can climb onto his back again and rolls his eyes when he _waves_ at the man who tried to kill him. They leave through the broken window.

“Please tell me you don’t usually make friends with the people you fight,” Tony says over the wind.

“No. He was nice though.”

“Kid, you can’t be serious.”

“I mean he was! He took the spell off and everything.”

It’s the concussion. That has to be why Peter is such a dumbass tonight. God, he hopes it’s just the concussion.

…

Peter honestly hasn’t had time to think since being waking up to his room on fire. Everything had been one thing after another, so the flight back to their building is almost nice. Evening is sinking across the city, turning everything red and gold. People are everywhere, most looking up into the sky when they fly by and they’re close enough that he can see their expressions of awe, wonder, and surprise.

Tony glides them back in the workshop and Peter hops off as his jets drop them down. He pulls his mask off, ignoring the sting of his stitches catching slightly. He watches in fascination as Tony’s suit folds away from him and flies itself back to its secure house. It will never not be cool that he gets to live with Iron Man.

“How are you feeling?” Tony asks softly, looking him up and down.

“Not great. Think I need a shower, I smell gross,” Peter says, trying to keep his sensitive nose from inhaling the acrid wildfire smell coming off him.

“Yeah, me too,” Tony sighs, brushing at his singed jeans. Peter thinks they look kind of cool that way. “Head hurt?”

Peter nods lightly. “Where am I gonna sleep?” Peter asks, feeling hesitant and unsure. He really hopes this isn’t the straw that breaks the camel’s back. He knows Tony cares about him, the man has gone above and beyond to show him that, but these latest mishaps were a lot, and now he’s added property damage to the list.

“Kid, there’s like, ten bedrooms in here, I think. I don’t even know. Hell, you can sleep in my room if you want,” Tony says offhandedly.

“W—um well—I think I’d like to do that, actually,” Peter says before his insecurity can get the better of him. He won’t admit to it, but he’s shaken. There’s no way to be sure that his curse is gone and he’d rather not be alone, in case something else happens.

Tony doesn’t need Peter to admit it, though. He knows, he understands. “Yeah sure,” he says as though it’s not a big deal at all, and it’s not really, but both of them are a little relieved, and a little glad that they’ve come this far.

Peter showers first, in Tony’s shower, and the man lends him some clothes that don’t smell like smoke. Peter is mostly asleep when Tony finally gets into the bed, big enough that they probably won’t even notice the other is there. Peter falls asleep almost immediately, enveloped in safety, and Tony goes not long after, happy to play his role of protector.

…

It’s a normal Thursday. Peter wakes up around 10 because there’s no way he’s being allowed to go to school today, and takes the pain pills happily handed over by Tony. He showers, enjoying the heated floor, eats a bowl of cereal that he made himself and watches SpongeBob.

Tony makes sandwiches for lunch and let’s Peter help with putting them together. They watch movies all day and the pizza they order for dinner arrives 15 minutes after they call for it.

He doesn’t drop, spill, or lose anything. Nothing stops working, no fires are started, the power stays on, and the chandeliers stay attached to the ceiling. There are no injuries, or illnesses, or emergencies. Not a single unlucky thing occurs, the entire day. 

**Author's Note:**

> Tony: Couldn't get more unlucky than finding out your girlfriend's dad is your arch-nemesis, tho  
> Peter: We're literally both orphans


End file.
